Using a regular amp as a slave

What do you mean 'regular" amp? A non-guitar amp, that you want to reproduce the sound coming from your guitar amp?
If your guitar amp has a pre-amp out, that might give you something to work with. If you want the exact sound from your guitar amp speaker, you need to mic that.
 
I would imagine you mean for live, as slaving an amp is usually done for volume.

you can run an instrument cable from your main amp's line-out to the slaved line in; To get as close as possible, 'tis true, you would have to mic your main amp. But by the time you have done that, probably best to send that mic feed to the FOH board- the house sound engineer can do a far better job of upping your sound with his resources than you can with a slaved amp.

Only reason for slaving one amp to another is b/c you want the pre-amp tone of one, the power amp, speaker and cab tone of the other.
 
Some amps are made to slave. These amps have slave outputs and slave inputs. Obviously you would connect the slave output of the main amp into the slave input of the second amp.

Most of the time. you can accomplish the same thing by connecting the effects loop output of the first amp to the effects loop input on the second amp. But that depends on the way the effects loops are implemented on the amps you are using.
 
Farview got it.

By regular amp I meant a guitar amp, sorry.

The deal is, my friends and I are doing a cover set on the 22nd and were looking into having a huge rig as we're not going to be mic'd and we're headlining the whole gig (punk cover sets, we're doing it as Black Flag). So we just wanna be able to to have as many cabs going as possible.
 
Walt-Dogg said:
Farview got it.

By regular amp I meant a guitar amp, sorry.

The deal is, my friends and I are doing a cover set on the 22nd and were looking into having a huge rig as we're not going to be mic'd and we're headlining the whole gig (punk cover sets, we're doing it as Black Flag). So we just wanna be able to to have as many cabs going as possible.
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The easiest way to do this would be to get an A/B/Y box or some sort of stereo stompbox and go into the front of both amps.
 
ggunn said:
The easiest way to do this would be to get an A/B/Y box or some sort of stereo stompbox and go into the front of both amps.
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Yeah, but I'd rather slave an amp to the whatever amp I'm going to be using than going out and buying an ABY box.
 
Walt-Dogg said:
Farview got it.

By regular amp I meant a guitar amp, sorry.

The deal is, my friends and I are doing a cover set on the 22nd and were looking into having a huge rig as we're not going to be mic'd and we're headlining the whole gig (punk cover sets, we're doing it as Black Flag). So we just wanna be able to to have as many cabs going as possible.
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How many watts are you running on your guitar amps?

How many watts will you have for the vocalist?

How big is the venue?

If you only have lower watt amps then i can see the point but if you're already dealing with 100 watt amps then i see a nightmare waiting to happen.


I've been there.Better stand 2 feet from the drummer so you can hear him/her.Probably won't hear the other players over your own stage volume etc.
If it's a smaller place i found that if running more than one cab it's better to keep them both on the floor other than stacking them as a full stack.It's much easier to hear the drummer and it'll keep the timing in check instead of blasting yourself in the head with a wall of sound.

If your loud and the fans are drunk they'll still dig it though :drunk:
 
mcmetal said:
If you only have lower watt amps then i can see the point but if you're already dealing with 100 watt amps then i see a nightmare waiting to happen.
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Just because he's using two amps, doesn't mean he's going to have them both decked. I used to have cabinets on both sides of the stage just to even out the sound coming off the stage. That way you didn't just get blasted with bass if you were standing on one side and guitar on the other. All of it was just loud enough so we could hear ourselves mixed with the drummer.
 
If you can't afford a good A/B Y-box, you can do it with a splitter cable, but the impedances probably will not match up and one amp will sound lower or more hummy than the other.
 
Well it looks like me (as Greg Ginn) and the other guitar player (as Dez) are just gonna be using two Marshall cabs each and some old Peavey and Sunn solid state heads and the bass player (as Chuck D) is just gonna be using an Ampeg 8x10 and whatever head he can procure. Thanks for all your input, though I'm still somewhat clueless as how to slave an amp.
 
Walt-Dogg said:
Well it looks like me (as Greg Ginn) and the other guitar player (as Dez) are just gonna be using two Marshall cabs each and some old Peavey and Sunn solid state heads and the bass player (as Chuck D) is just gonna be using an Ampeg 8x10 and whatever head he can procure. Thanks for all your input, though I'm still somewhat clueless as how to slave an amp.
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With "regular" guitar amps and no other equipment, you can't. Slaving doesn't mean just playing through two amps, it means that both amps respond to the controls on the master amp. With two amps with effects loops, you can probably take the send of one and connect to the receive of the other and get both amps to respond to the controls of the sending amp, but in this case you are only using the power section of the receiving amp.

If all you want to do is play through two amps (which isn't slaving) you can use a A/B/Y splitter or any stereo stompbox to generate two outputs to drive the amps. You can also just use a splitter cable, but you sacrifice some signal level at the input of the amps.

All the above has been posted in this thread already. What else do you need to know?
 
If the amps have two inputs it is simple to get the full power of both.(or more)This does not work on some amps.I used to do this back in the day with a couple of fender twins:
Plug guitar into input one of amp one.Plug one end of a guitar cable into input two of amp one.Plug the other end of guitar cable into input one of amp two.You are done.Crank and enjoy.
 
This has something to do with jumping effects loops is all I know.

You know, I'm really disappointed...

I asked a question to find out facts, not your opinions on how to make a rig.
 
Farview said:
Just because he's using two amps, doesn't mean he's going to have them both decked. I used to have cabinets on both sides of the stage just to even out the sound coming off the stage. That way you didn't just get blasted with bass if you were standing on one side and guitar on the other. All of it was just loud enough so we could hear ourselves mixed with the drummer.
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I agree.That's why i asked how many watts he's pushing.I've had cabs on both sides myself but i used a 100 watt tube head and never needed to slave for more power.

I've done shows in smaller venues where there wasn't much of a PA.Enough power for vox and maybe the kick and snare.Crank the amps and create a backline 80's style.

I'd rather have a good mix at a lower volume but sometimes you have to work with what you got.


Walt-Dogg said:
This has something to do with jumping effects loops is all I know.

You know, I'm really disappointed...

I asked a question to find out facts, not your opinions on how to make a rig.
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Fairview gave good advice with using the effects loop.Use the send from effects loop on the amp you're plugged into and feed the signal to the other amp.You could probably feed the signal into the input of the other amp but use it's clean channel.Eq as needed.

If you don't have an effects loop than maybe check the website of the amps you're using.They should have user manuals online you can check out and see what options are available.

Also if you're using a stomp box or a multi-effects unit with stereo outputs just run a cord to both amps.

Sorry if you're disappointed but without us knowing what gear you'll be using we can only help so much... just saying :rolleyes:
 
Basically I am going to be backlining with a huge PA focused on drums and vocals at this gig.

Right there is another case of the disappointment. I know how to this all those other ways. I want to know how to slave an amp with using it's pre-in and out or effects loop. I have a decent idea now. BUT, it was stated some amps just cant do it.
 
Walt-Dogg said:
Basically I am going to be backlining with a huge PA focused on drums and vocals at this gig.

Right there is another case of the disappointment. I know how to this all those other ways. I want to know how to slave an amp with using it's pre-in and out or effects loop. I have a decent idea now. BUT, it was stated some amps just cant do it.
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I don't know how well this is going to work for you, though - it really depends how your FX loop is wired. If you have a "blend" control that is post-loop rather than pre you should be ok - simply set the blend to 100% dry then run a line from your "main" amp's FX send into your "slave" amp's FX return, and you'll get the preamp signal from your main amp running through both poweramps.

If you have a series FX loop or your blend is pre-loop, however, you can't do it this way - plugging something from the FX send without running that same signal back into the FX return will effectively mute the signal coming out of the main amp's speakers in the first scenario, and in the second the signal from both amps will be attenuated based on where the blend is set - your best bet would be leaving it in the middle, in which case the power amp would only be seeing 50% of the signal it was designed to take.
 
So how do the pros do it with a wall of Marshalls? (I know - they mic one and the rest are dummies but it wasn't always like this.)


lou
 
It's really not that complicated.Reread my above post and look at the pic below.Done this way you are accessing each preamp and full power section of every amp in the chain.If there is one amp in the chain that has a particular sound you like, crank it up and bring the others in with a little less gain or whatever and shape the E.Q.'s to reinforce it.
BTW, you will have better luck using one hundred watter and one 412.If it is the visual effect of a wall of amps you are after, just roll the others up there and dont plug them in.No one will be the wiser and you will still be on speaking terms with the soundman and your band mates.
 

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All I want is the ability to power more cabs than just two with my head, just my one head. I live for it's pre-amp tone. I don't want any coloration, and no other amps' tones involved, that's why I want to use a slave. And trust me I'd buy a slave, if I had the time or money to find one. (Using a red knob Sunn Concert Lead, looking only to use a matching red knob Concert Slave). But since I can't I'd like to just know the next best way to do it with your average guitar amp.
 
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